The Present Age Weekly Recap: February 4, 2022
Gold cubes, not-your-grandpa's Newsweek, silence from the free speech crowd, and recommendations to get your weekend going.
Welcome to the weekly recap. In this post, I’ll be linking to my work from the week, sharing some stories from others I thought were interesting, and providing a few casual thoughts on [gestures at everything]. If you’d like to receive this weekly email ONLY, please go to your account page and under “Email notifications” uncheck every box except “TPA Weekly Recap.” If you don’t want to receive the weekly recap, leave all boxes except “TPA Weekly Recap” checked. (This format and disclaimer was inspired by Ty Burr’s Watch List)
This was a big we(e/a)k for the world of media.
On Monday, I wrote about the predictable silence on Republican efforts to ban books about race and LGBTQ issues in classrooms and libraries (both school and public).
On Tuesday, I sent out a newsletter detailing the fall of Newsweek, illustrating how it went from respectable magazine to right-wing fever swamp by comparing how it used to refer to right-wing operative Jack Posobiec (“…an ‘alt-right’ internet activist best known for the ‘pizzagate’ conspiracy theory that falsely suggested Hillary Clinton ran a sex trafficking ring from a Washington, D.C., pizza joint”) to handing him the publication’s large platform for a dubious op-ed about China.
And on Wednesday, I bid CNN president Jeff Zucker a not-so-fond farewell.
Posts from others that I want to draw attention to:
Over at The Uprising, Hunter Walker continues his great reporting on all things related to the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol and efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
On a related topic, with former President Donald Trump’s announcement that he may pardon people who tried to overthrow the government if he runs and wins the election in 2024, I highly recommend checking out Ruth Ben-Ghiat’s piece about how authoritarians use pardons to gain and accumulate power.
And on the topic of the ongoing brouhaha happening over at Spotify regarding Joe Rogan, I recommend checking out Ryan Broderick’s Garbage Day post featuring Max Collins from the band Eve 6 (you know, the “heart in a blender” song guy). It shines a light on some of the other big issues with streaming services like Spotify (namely, that a lot of artists, Eve 6 included, get screwed out of a lot of money).
That gold cube thing really pissed me off. The US has entered what many are calling "The New Guilded Age" and some asshole just plops a useless hunk of metal worth $11 million in the middle of New York City. Who's "stability and endurance" is that really speaking to? Probably not the 80,000 or so New Yorkers who are homeless and could use a share of that $11 million.